ABOUT THIS BOOK

Vivid and racy, a deep-dive into tabloids from their sixteenth-century beginnings to the National Inquirer and beyond.

The Newsmongers unfolds the seedy history of tabloid journalism, from the first printed “Strange Newes” sheets of the sixteenth century to the sensationalism of today’s digital age. The narrative weaves from Regency gossip writers through New York’s “yellow journalism” battles to the “sex and sleaze” Sun of the 1970s; and from the Brexit-backing populism of the Daily Mail to the celebrity-obsessed Mail Online of the 2000s. Colorful figures such as Daniel Defoe, Lord Northcliffe, Joseph Pulitzer, William Randolph Hearst, Hugh Cudlipp, Rupert Murdoch, and Robert Maxwell are brought to vivid life.

From scandalous confessions to the Leveson Inquiry into the behavior of the British press, the book explores journalists’ unscrupulous methods, taking in phone hacking, privacy breaches, and bribery. And now, in the digital era, The Newsmongers shows how popular journalism has succumbed to so-called churnalism while a certain royal is seeking revenge on the tabloids today.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

Terry Kirby is a senior lecturer in journalism at Goldsmiths, University of London, and the author of The Trials of the Baroness. He has been a journalist for more than four decades and has worked for local, regional, and national newspapers.

REVIEWS

"A fabulous, detailed and hugely entertaining account of tabloid journalism, starting from the first cave paintings to the more recent abuses of privacy by some of our most popular newspapers. Kirby reveals how a tabloid sensibility has always been a part of our media landscape and is likely to continue well into the digital age. The book confronts the moguls, editors, headlines, and scandals that have dominated tabloid life in the search for influence, notoriety, and profits. A must-read for anyone who wants to understand the role of tabloids in British society."

— Des Freedman, professor of media and communications, Goldsmiths, University of London

"Tabloids were founded to inform and entertain, and this history manages to do both. Descriptive and largely uncritical, Kirby does something very few of the editors whose work he analyses would ever allow. He lets the facts speak for themselves."

— Roy Greenslade, former editor, media commentator, and professor of journalism

"Like its subject, this book is not only accessible and entertaining, but a detailed, critical and authoritative history of a vital and controversial part of our culture and politics. At the very moment when newspapers are most challenged, The Newsmongers reminds us that journalism is always changing and that the popular press is often the most innovative."

— Charlie Beckett, founding director of Polis and professor in the Department of Media and Communications, London School of Economics

"A first-class book from a first-class journalist. Kirby tells a highly readable story that whisks us from the age of deference by way of scandal, sleaze and sensation to the era of clickbait, the Kardashians and rampant criminality. The Newsmongers presents a more than timely insight into the most powerful political force in the United Kingdom today: the tabloid press."

— Brian Cathcart, former professor of journalism at Kingston University and a former director of Hacked Off

"The average Observer reader might be unfamiliar with contemporary tabloid newspapers, but in this informative . . . survey of that subsection of journalism, Kirby studies everyone from Daniel Defoe to Rupert Murdoch, ruthlessly dissecting their venality and opportunism. He also, in the interests of balance, salutes them when they dared to do something their competition would have balked at. . . . Few will end this book thinking better of tabloids, but it’s sometimes hard not to admire their—and their proprietors’—chutzpah."

— Observer

"Kirby doesn't avoid the shameful episodes . . . but nor is the book a hatchet job. It is a balanced look at a phenomenon probably now in its twilight years, at least in print form. . . . The Newsmongers is at its strongest when covering the ceaseless innovation that characterised tabloids throughout much of the twentieth century. . . . Kirby's book is an entertaining read, or as a tabloid might put it, a sensational soaraway success."

— Critic

"Kirby traces the decline of a format that has its origins in the sensationalist pamphlets of the seventeenth century."

— iNews

"Kirby brings us the history of one of the most infamous British institutions, tabloid journalism. . . . The Newsmongers is an essential read for anyone wanting to understand how our media is the way it is, and in the state it is."

— History with Jackson

"A broadsheet journalist’s account of tabloid journalism. It focuses on the narrative of the story, keeps the who-what-when-why-how front and centre, has many central villains, and few heroes. One thing that is abundantly clear by the time you reach the end of the book is that British tabloid journalism bears no relation to the news and has two primary aims: making money and wielding political power. . . . Kirby’s account is raw and pacy."

— Morning Star

"Kirby, a journalist and lecturer at Goldsmiths, University of London, brings serious analysis to these light publications, noting that the public has long had an appetite for lurid news. . . . A largely enjoyable and enlightening story—for journalists, of course, but also for anyone who wants to understand better the intricate relationship between newspapers and their rapt readers."

— The Economist

"A history of tabloid journalism through which booze swills like blood through an abattoir. . . . A book that, while being breezy as it ought to be, keeps a weather eye on the moral wreckage the red-tops have wreaked."

— The Oldie

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